UNESCO awards Ahmet Şık annual press freedom prize

New
York, April 11, 2014--The Committee to Protect Journalists congratulates Turkish
investigative journalist and book author Ahmet Şık on being awarded UNESCO's
prestigious Guillermo Cano World Press Freedom Prize. The annual prize, named after
slain Colombian journalist Guillermo Cano Isaza, honors a journalist or
organization that "has made an outstanding contribution to the defense of press
freedom." Şık will receive the award on May 2 at UNESCO's headquarters in Paris,
as part of the UNESCO celebrations for World Press Freedom Day.

"We
are thrilled to congratulate Ahmet Şık on this much-deserved honor," CPJ Europe
and Central Asia Program Coordinator Nina Ognianova said. "But we note that
while Şık is being celebrated as a press freedom hero internationally, he is
being prosecuted as a criminal at home. We call on Turkish authorities to
immediately drop all charges against him and allow him to do his work without
reprisal."

Şık, a defendant in the controversial Odatv
case, faces charges
that stem from his unpublished book, The Imam's Army, which was
highly critical of a community led by exiled charismatic cleric Fethullah
Gülen. In a separate case, the journalist is criminally charged in connection
with making
critical remarks about the police, judges, and prosecutors involved in the Odatv
case. Earlier this week, CPJ sent
a letter to Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan expressing concern
about the Turkish government's recent steps to restrict the independent Turkish
media.